COLUMBUS - Ohio Gov. John Kasich on Friday spared death row inmate Raymond Tibbetts, who was convicted of killing his wife and landlord in Cincinnati more than two decades ago.

Kasich – going against the recommendation of the Ohio Parole Board – said that there were "fundamental flaws" in sentencing Tibbetts. Jurors didn't learn about Tibbett's background as a neglected and abused child.

One juror, Ross Geiger, brought those concerns to Kasich's attention earlier this year in a letter that prompted the governor to delay Tibbetts' Feb. 13 execution to give the parole board more time to review the matter.

Geiger told The Enquirer he's glad Kasich took his concerns seriously, but he said he's sorry the families of Tibbetts' victims had to endure more months of uncertainty and media attention.

Kasich commuted Tibbetts' sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Tibbetts had been set to be executed Oct. 17.

Tibbetts had been sentenced to death for beating his wife, Sue Crawford, to death and fatally stabbing his landlord, Fred Hicks, on the same day in 1997 in Over-the-Rhine.

The Ohio Parole Board had given Tibbetts' case a second look after a former juror, Ross Geiger of Loveland, wrote a letter to Kasich, expressing concern that jurors didn't know more about Tibbett's background before sentencing him to death. Ultimately, the parole board voted 8-1 against clemency.

Kasich disagreed. In a news release, the governor explained that "the defense’s failure to present sufficient mitigating evidence, coupled with an inaccurate description of Tibbetts’s childhood by the prosecution, essentially prevented the jury from making an informed decision about whether Tibbetts deserved the death penalty."

Mark Hicks, the nephew of Fred Hicks, had pleaded with Ohio officials to execute Tibbetts for his crimes in a letter.

"The Hicks family knows Governor Kasich has what it takes to sign a death warrant. He's proven he is going to follow the law! The law in Ohio allows for heinous killers like Tibbetts to be executed," Hicks wrote.